Non-Nuclear Factors of Nuclear Disarmament

INSTITUTE OF WORLD ECONOMY AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS RUSSIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES NUCLEAR THREAT INITIATIVE This publication is dedicated to the memory of Alexander Pikaev, our colleague and friend NON-NUCLEAR FACTORS OF NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT (Ballistic Missile Defense, High-Precision Conventional Weapons, Space Arms) Foreword by Academician Alexander A. Dynkin at the Conference "Missile Defense, Non-Proliferation and Deep Re- duction of Nuclear Weapons" Alexei Arbatov, Vladimir Dvorkin and Sergey Oznobishchev Moscow IMEMO RAN 2010 УДК 327 ББК 66.2 (0) Non 76 Foreword by Academician Alexander A. Dynkin at the Conference "Missile Defense, Non-Proliferation and Deep Reduction of Nuclear Weapons" Alexei Arbatov, Vladimir Dvorkin and Sergey Oznobishchev Non 76 Non-Nuclear Factors of Nuclear Disarmament (Ballistic Missile De- fense, High-Precision Conventional Weapons, Space Arms). Alexei Arbatov, Vladimir Dvorkin, Sergey Oznobishchev.– Mos- cow, IMEMO RAN, 2010. – 67 p. ISBN 978-5-9535-0260-3 Non-nuclear Factors of Nuclear Disarmament (Ballistic Missile De- fense, High-Precision Conventional Weapons, Space Arms) This is the third publication of the series titled "Russia and the Deep Nuclear Disarmament", which is to be issued in the framework of joint project implemented by the Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO) and the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Inc. (NTI). It is based on the discussions at the conference held on June 22, 2010. The authors express their gratitude to the IMEMO staff for compre- hensive support in the production of this research paper and organization of the fruitful discussion. This research report was commissioned by the Nu- clear Security Project (NSP) of the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI). For more information see the NSP website at http://www.nuclearsecurity.org. The views expressed in this paper are entirely the authors' own and not those of the IMEMO or NSP. To view IMEMO RAN publications, please visit our website at http://www.imemo.ru ISBN 978-5-9535-0260-3 © IMEMO RAN, 2010 2 CONTENTS FOREWORD BY ACADEMICIAN ALEXANDER A. DYNKIN, DIRECTOR, IN- STITUTE OF WORLD ECONOMY AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS (IM- EMO) OF THE RUSSIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES…………….………………… 5 SUMMARY .…………………………...…................................................................. 10 INTRODUCTION ………………………………...…………………………………… 14 1. PROSPECTS FOR COOPERATION BETWEEN THE US, NATO AND RUSSIA ON BALLISTIC MISSILE DEFENSE ………………………………………………… 18 2. STRATEGIC HIGH-PRECISION CONVENTIONAL WEAPONS ………………… 26 3. PREVENTING SPACE ARMS RACE ……………………......................................... 39 4. CODE OF CONDUCT IN OUTER SPACE ………………………………………… 52 CONCLUSIONS ……………………………………………………………………….. 56 ABBREVIATIONS ……………………………………………………………………. 63 ANNEX. LIST OF PARTICIPANTS IN THE MEETING HELD ON JUNE 22, 2010 AT IMEMO RAN .............................................................................................................. 65 3 4 FOREWORD by Academician Alexander A. Dynkin, Director, Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO) of the Russian Acad- emy of Sciences Esteemed participants in the Conference, This is the third of this year’s four meetings under the general topic "Russia and Deep Nuclear Disarmament". Before opening this conference, I would like to express deep sorrow on my behalf and on behalf of the entire Institute for the untimely demise of our colleague and friend Doctor Alexander A. Pikaev, a key expert at IMEMO, a talented scientist renowned both in this country and abroad, and one of the pioneers of this project. I am extending my sincerest condo- lences to his family and friends. Let us now hold a moment of silence for him… Please be seated. This day – June 22 – is deeply etched in the memory of generations of Russia’s nationals and the citizens of almost every country of the former Soviet Union as the day when the Great Patriotic War began 69 years ago. For us, this is the day of deepest national sorrow, the date of the disastrous and inglorious failure of Stalin’s foreign and military policy at large. Yet, at the same time this is the day to commemorate the supreme bravery of our people who eventually achieved victory at the cost of unthinkable sacri- fices. In some general sense, the aim of our mutual effort here is to prevent any similar threat in the future, whatever its origin. This NTI-IMEMO session will focus on the fundamental issue of strategic and political relations between the United States and its allies, on the one hand and Russia, on the other hand: the influence of the development and potential deployment of theatre missile defense (TMD) and, in the longer term, of global strategic ballistic missile defense on nuclear non- proliferation and further nuclear arms reductions. However, in the course of implementing the joint IMEMO RAN-NTI program, we were forced to make certain adjustment to our plans. Due to circumstances beyond our control, namely the eruption of the volcano with 5 a name that sounds like a tongue-twister, the participants from abroad could not make it to the previous conference in April. Back then, we were looking at the issues of deep nuclear disarmament in the context of NATO- Russia relations. This time we decided to use the window of opportunity offered by the temporary break in the volcano’s activity and include this item in the agenda for this meeting. It would be certainly unfair to limit the discussion of this subject to Russian perceptions that were outlined in the book published in the follow- up of the previous conference, the more so, as several reputable and widely recognized experts from the US and Western Europe have accepted the invitation to participate in our session. We appreciate their attendance and are happy to greet them at our meeting at IMEMO. Thus, there are some changes to our agenda. At the first session of our meeting we will give the floor to the foreign participants in the conference and discuss their contributions. The second half of the day will be devoted to presentations by the Russian experts that we will later discuss together with our foreign colleagues. Though I am by no means trying to predetermine the course of the conference, I would like to stress that the influence of BMD systems on nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation depends not only on specifica- tions of the defense systems – in no smaller extent it is determined by the military-political format of their development. Developing BMD systems on the basis of NATO/US-Russia cooperation will, among other things, practically contribute to further reduction and non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. A recent evidence of this is the unified position of the great powers on the UN Security Council resolution on Iran concurrent with the can- cellation of US plan to deploy a strategic BMD system in Europe and with the signing of a new START Treaty. However, developing and expanding BMD on a unilateral basis or only within the framework of the existing alliances, is most likely to hinder further nuclear disarmament and disrupt the cooperation of the great powers in the sphere of non-proliferation with all the consequences that come with it, including the extension of the nuclear club and the possibility of terrorists' gaining access to nuclear weapons. Yet, just to say that the great powers should cooperate on BMD would be far from sufficient. Indeed, despite the fact that in the 1990s and in the current decade the United States and Russia have made quite a num- ber of unilateral proposals and even had a series of joint computer-assisted exercises and signed several joint documents, things have not got off the ground. The truth is that joint development of BMD requires addressing a whole range of most complicated issues. In addition to technical and finan- 6 cial matters (such as secrecy, intellectual property protection, operational compatibility as well as the sharing of costs, research and development and, subsequently, the allocation of operational functions) there are serious strategic and political issues to tackle. It is assumed that a joint tactical missile defense system (TMD) de- signed to protect the US, its allies and Russia against sub-strategic rockets would not cause major strategic frictions, since the two powers do not pos- sess intermediate- and shorter range missiles. However, the dividing line between tactical and strategic ballistic missile defense is presently rather vague and will only be further dissolved as technologies advance. Most or all of the missile capabilities of other nuclear states (China, India, Pakistan, Israel and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK)) and non-nuclear-weapon states possessing missile capabilities (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Libya and Yemen) consist of shorter- or medium-range weapons. Hence, these states will surely assume that a joint US-Russia BMD is aimed against them. Are the United States, Russia and their allies prepared for the reac- tion of the said states to their joint TMD, and are the great powers on the same page as to which of these states should be regarded a priority threat? As to strategic BMD, things are even more complicated. For the time, the strategic relations between the US and Russia (plus the forces of the UK and France) are based on mutual nuclear deterrence, which in its turn relies on mutual ability to inflict unacceptable damage with interconti- nental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and sea-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs); this model of relations was once

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